Costa Rica With Kids (Part VI): Rincón de la Vieja National Park with Kids

For Spring Break 2018, my family of four traveled to Costa Rica and spent one full week at the Andaz Papagayo. To read about why we chose Costa Rica with kids and booking logistics, visit Costa Rica With Kids (Part I): Why Costa Rica and Booking Logistics. 

Rincón de la Vieja is an active volcano located just 15 miles from Liberia. As one of six active volcanoes in Costa Rica, Rincón de la Vieja last erupted in 2017 and forms the highest point in Rincón de la Vieja National Park, a large conservation area.  The Park also has a number of fumaroles and hot springs, which we gladly explored on our day trip to the Park.

Getting to Rincón de la Vieja National Park:

The Park has two entrances, one at Santa Maria and one in Las Pailas. We drove our rental car from the Andaz Papagayo to the Las Pailas park entrance, which we knew in advance would take about 90 minutes. Although we had purchased the GPS map of Costa Rica for our Garmin, the map kept directing us through windy back roads in Liberia. At one point, we were clearly in a residential area, and the road transitioned from paved-but-in-rough-shape to dirt. I quickly decided at that point that we should turn around and head back to the main intersection in Liberia. Luckily for me, I had just enough cell reception to google “getting to rincon de la vieja,” and I was able to find this website, which provided us with the following set of instructions:

To Las Pailas sector: Coming from Liberia International Airport, drive to Liberia city (turn left out onto the main road from the airport). At the main intersection into Liberia (Santa Rosa plaza on your right, Burger King on your left, McDonalds in front of you), turn left. Drive about 3.5 kilometers and you will see many signs for “Rincon de la Vieja National Park Las Pailas sector.” Turn right into the entrance after the Ebais clinic on your left and continue on this road for about 20 kilometers to the national park entrance and the trail heads.

There is a parking lot where the administration office is, which is where you’ll buy the entrance tickets.

The website is dated March 2016, but I can tell you that the Ebais clinic no longer exists and there are not “many signs…” There may have been one sign directing us to the Park, but it certainly was not at the intersection where we were supposed to turn right. Pro Tip: I wish I had looked up the GPS coordinates as others report having more success using that method than simply entering the destination. The approximate GPS map coordinates of Rincón Las Pailas are latitude 10.773, longitude -85.3499.

Prior to entering the Park itself, we encountered a private road with an individual collecting toll to access. I was instantly thankful that my husband stopped at an ATM while we were trying to find proper instructions in Liberia because there is no way we would have been able to pay the private access toll to the gentlemen collecting the fee. Not only did he not speak English, but he also seemed a bit peeved that all we had were large bills (thanks to the ATM). The toll fee was 700 CR or approximately $1.25 USD per person. Note: he did not charge an access fee for the kids.

Private road toll collector.

I paid this 700 colon entrance fee with a 20 MILLION colon bill. I’m pretty sure the guy wasn’t happy with me.

Once we were granted access on the private road, we continued the main road up to Park. Along the way, we passed a number of hotels and adventure outfitters, as well as quite a few podiums, which I quickly learned were for skydiving. We also passed a few groups of people clearly on a horseback riding tour.

What to do at Rincón de la Vieja National Park?

When we arrived at the Park, I was surprised to see this completely modern and beautiful building surrounded by a dirt parking lot with rather haphazardly parked vehicles everywhere. As we entered the building, I was pleased to learn that we could pay the fee via credit card in USD (which is what I did).

Be sure to bring your passport!

After paying the fee, I showed our tickets to a woman sitting at the desk, who wrote down our ticket numbers and time of entry. We also had to show these tickets when we left, which leads me to believe that this is how they track visitors to make sure they leave the Park.

Once inside, we used the modern facilities (which we sincerely appreciated) and my youngest took the opportunity to gawk at the snakes displayed in jars of formaldehyde.

There were fountains for filling water bottles and also hoses for rinsing off feet.

My husband and I took a quick inventory of the hikes available. There are a number of hiking trails in the Park, and there are quite a few that are accessible from the Las Pailas, which is why we chose Las Pailas. One of the hikes is an 8 km hike to the summit of the volcano, which was closed due to recent volcano activity.

Without any idea of what the hike to the La Canegra waterfall would be like, we decided that while 4.3 km (or 2.67 miles) might be a tad ambitious with our 3.5 year old, we should still give it a try and see how far we could get. Spoiler alert: we didn’t get very far.

The deceptively mild beginning of the waterfall hike…

The hike starts off easy enough with a wide open grassy path. Along the way, we passed the closed trail to the crater. Unfortunately, the path quickly turned hazardous and became not only rocky, but extremely steep and filled with branches. We were probably just 1/2 a mile in before I realized there was no way we were going to get down from the hike with our 3.5 year old intact, so we turned around.

This was probably the fourth or fifth climb of its kind … and the point at which I decided we needed to turn back.

Back at our original starting point, we decided to go on the third available hike: a 3 km (or 1.86 mile) loop around boiling mud pots. Having visited Yellowstone, my husband and I weren’t all too impressed by the boiling mud pots, but it was a first time experience for our kids and our 8 year old particularly loved seeing all the different fumaroles and volcanitos. Much of the path is paved and there are no steep climbs, so this was an easy walk for our family of four. Some portions of the path are shaded, which we appreciated, because it was very hot being out in the direct sunlight, especially whilst surrounded by active volcanoes.

Final Thoughts and Tips:

Our experience at the Park itself was slightly underwhelming, but I blame that largely on the fact that we could not hike to the waterfall or visit any of the hot springs due to having a 3.5 year old in our party. It was a nice way to spend the day, however, and my kids loved seeing the volcanic activity up close. Personally, I was thankful we had rented a car and were driving ourselves to Rincón instead of participating in one of the many shared tours offered through the hotel. The hotel’s prices for a trip to Rincon would have cost us $288 total ($98/adult and $46/child ages 3-10). While the tour includes roundtrip transportation, lunch, admission fee, and a bilingual guide, we would not have been able to do the hiking portion of the tour or would have had to split up because there’s no way my 3.5 year old could have lasted the entire hike. In fact, while on our less than 2 mile loop around the hot pots, we saw numerous family groups that were clearly on some kind of private tour similar to the tour offered through the hotel. Long story short, I was thrilled that our day trip to Rincón set us back only $37.50 out of pocket ($2.50 in private toll access and $35 for two adults and one child to enter the Park as children under 6 are free) and would recommend anyone traveling to Rincón consider renting a car and making the trip yourself as it is perfectly safe and manageable.

If you’re traveling to Rincon de la Vieja with kids, be sure to:

• pack plenty of water, sunscreen, hats, and mosquito repellent,
• wear breathable clothing as it can be very hot (it was in the high 90s when we visited and we were all boiling by the end of our walk around the fumaroles),
• bring your passport as it is required to purchase your admission ticket to the National Park,
• use the facilities located at the entrance as there are no facilities later on, and
• be prepared for anything. As we finished our walk around the fumaroles, we saw that the trail to La Canegra was closed without warning or explanation. It would be a huge disappointment to head up there hoping to climb La Canegra only to find the path closed.

For more on our trip to Costa Rica, read about our Easter Sunday open air mass and our service visit to Escuela Pacifica, and our day trip to Diamante Eco Adventure Park.